GOP fired up on Obama gas talk

Republicans are doing a coordinated messaging blitz this week on gas prices.

Senate Republicans have floor speeches, press conferences, cable TV hits, social media and other strategies on tap to attack President Barack Obama after he trashed Republicans and defended his energy record during a speech last Thursday in the swing state of Florida.

Story Continued Below

“Yeah, that got everyone riled up,” a senior Senate GOP aide said. “We’ve fired up the machine on this one.”

Senate Republican Conference Chairman John Thune used an op-ed in POLITICO on Monday to criticize Obama’s policies as impeding domestic energy production on federal lands and waters.

“President Barack Obama likes to take credit for this energy boom, but in reality, recent U.S. energy growth is largely a result of private-sector investment and policies put in place by his predecessors,” Thune wrote.

“The energy policies this president has adopted are jeopardizing the progress we have made, and if he continues them, the U.S. energy boom could soon be over.”

Republicans have mocked Obama’s use of late of their long-touted "all of the above" mantra.

“You notice at the State of the Union that was the one time when there was both a lot of applause and some chuckles from the Republican side,” Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) said.

This includes an RNC briefing Tuesday "on energy and Obama’s failure to address the problem” and a Web video featuring comments Obama made in Michigan in 2008 “promising to take care of the problem” — drawing on the attention Michigan’s GOP primary vote will be getting the same day, she said. Obama is also giving a speech Tuesday at the Detroit-based United Auto Workers’s legislative convention in Washington, where he is expected to tout his auto bailout and may also hit on new fuel efficiency standards.

The RNC will also “continue putting out old videos of Obama promising to fix the gas/energy problem in 2008 this week and as opportunities arise,” Kukowski emailed.

House Republicans will continue to talk about the issue as well.

“I expect it will be a topic at the stakeout tomorrow, certainly," wrote Michael Steel, spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner.

House Republicans had plenty of opportunity to talk about gas prices when they pushed through four energy bills two weeks ago before lawmakers were on break last week. This included plans to authorize the Keystone XL pipeline, approve oil and gas drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, expand drilling offshore and quicken oil shale production out West. That package will be rolled into a larger energy and infrastructure bill House Republicans continue to work on.

Meanwhile, prices at the pump have hit another February record — rising 13 cents in the past week to reach $3.72 per gallon, the Energy Information Administration reported Monday. Gas prices have increased for more than 30 consecutive days from a national average of $3.38 on Jan. 26, according to AAA.